Investing in Malawi’s Power Sector
MCC’s $350.7 million compact with Malawi, signed in 2011, is designed to revitalize the country’s power sector to improve the availability, reliability and quality of the power supply and promote economic growth. MCC is investing in infrastructure to increase the capacity of Malawi’s electrical grid while also working with the Government of Malawi and the […]
Empowering Women Cocoa Farmers
The World Cocoa Foundation Partnership Meeting (WCFPM) from 26th – 27th October 2016 brought together key leaders within the cocoa industry from private, public and civil society organisations. Attendees discussed the challenges of ensuring the sustainability of cocoa and farmers’ livelihoods. This year, the WCFPM was hosted in Côte d’Ivoire – described as the ‘land […]
Making the Most of Sustainability Opportunities
Environmental and social considerations are often presented as risks to businesses. However, if they’re properly integrated into strategies and decision-making they can very much become opportunities. For example, research from KPMG suggests implementing measures to improve job quality can increase profit margins by as much as 0.4 per cent in industries where profit margins typically […]
Poverty Footprint: A Unique Tool to Assess Business Impacts on Sustainable Development
By Ursula Wynhoven, Chief, Social Sustainability, Governance & Legal, UN Global Compact and Helen Van Hoeven, Deputy Director, Private Sector Department, Oxfam America As engines of economic growth, global companies have wide-ranging opportunities to positively affect the lives of the poor. Yet, company impacts on people living in poverty are largely not understood and under-reported. […]
Sharing Responsibility for Antimicrobial Resistance
With the release in May of the final report and recommendations of the Review on Antimicrobial Resistance, GBCHealth has convened a group of global leaders to discuss the potential impact of AMR and their priorities for immediate action. The #GBCtalksAMR series, which will be published over the next three weeks is intended to supplement the […]
Collaborating Across Sectors to Further Global Health
The Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs) are 17 specific goals, and 169 associated targets that set out quantitative objectives across the social, economic, and environmental dimensions of sustainable development, all to be achieved by 2030 (United Nations, 2015). Health has been recognized as crucial for sustainable human development (Alleyne et al., 2013) and an essential contributor […]
Tackling Antimicrobial Resistance in Food and Agricultural Sectors
With the release in May of the final report and recommendations of the Review on Antimicrobial Resistance, GBCHealth has convened a group of global leaders to discuss the potential impact of AMR and their priorities for immediate action. The #GBCtalksAMR series, which will be published over the next three weeks is intended to supplement the […]
Coca-Cola’s Contribution to Stability, Growth, and Optimism
In my article, I review the role of a global commercial organization, The Coca-Cola Company, in contributing to national stability in developing markets through a strategic approach to social and economic contribution. The company’s initiatives complement the role of policymakers, who are primarily responsible for the safety and prosperity of citizens, often using the Golden […]
Supporting Cacao Producers in Latin America
UK Chocolate Week celebrates the world of fine chocolate from 10th to 16th October, 2016. Chocolate Week aims to promote fine flavour chocolate, independent artisan chocolatiers and chocolate companies who work in direct partnership with cocoa farmers, encouraging consumers to pay a fairer price for their chocolate. Christian Aid has been actively engaged in high […]
Building Peace is Everybody’s Business
War is bad for business. The private sector, including both local and international companies, is often among the first to be hit by armed conflict. Investment and trading opportunities disappear, infrastructure is damaged and, most tragically of all, employees are killed. All of this should provide motivation for businesses to contribute to peacebuilding. Some are […]
Why Business May Contribute to Peace
What is increasingly clear from our work at the SDG Fund (a UN development mechanism, multi-donor agency that brings together UN Agencies, governments, civil society and business to achieve the Sustainable Development Goals) the complexity of the SDGs converge a guiding set of principles of interest to all actors. Paloma Duran, Director of the SDG […]
GBCHealth Talks Antimicrobial Resistance with GE Foundation
Interview with Dr. David M. Barash, Executive Director, Global Health Portfolio & Chief Medical Officer, GE Foundation With the release in May of the final report and recommendations of the Review on Antimicrobial Resistance, GBCHealth has convened a group of global leaders to discuss the potential impact of AMR and their priorities for immediate action. […]
The Impact of AMR and Priorities for Immediate Action
Interview with Dr. Nafsiah Mboi, Special Envoy for the Asia-Pacific Leaders Malaria Alliance With the release in May of the final report and recommendations of the Review on Antimicrobial Resistance, GBCHealth has convened a group of global leaders to discuss the potential impact of AMR and their priorities for immediate action. The series, which will […]
A Global Discussion on Antimicrobial Resistance
With the release in May of the final report and recommendations of the Review on Antimicrobial Resistance, GBCHealth has convened a group of global leaders to discuss the potential impact of AMR and their priorities for immediate action. The interview series, which will be published over the next three weeks, is intended to supplement the […]
How to Effectively Engage Business on Human Rights
Since the publication of the UN Guiding Principles and new regulation such as theModern Slavery Act, engaging business leaders on human rights has become extremely important. As the lead on human rights at SABMiller, one of my challenges has been to demystify the topic and help people focus on what it means in practice– all […]
Collaboration in Support of Micro-Enterprises in Value Chains
The “Growing Together” report – guidance to businesses to support them in helping micro-enterprises in their value chains to thrive, and why that is important for women’s economic empowerment. Our new report – “Growing Together”, developed with SABMiller, the Harvard Kennedy Corporate Responsibility Initiative and Business Fights Poverty, sets out why businesses should take a […]
Climate-Smart Agriculture Empowering Rural Smallholders
Since it was presented by FAO at the Hague Conference on Agriculture, Food Security and Climate Change in 2010 as an approach to achieve sustainable agricultural development for food security under climate change ‘climate-smart agriculture’ (CSA) has gathered both praise and criticism. While it has been defined as consisting of three pillars (increased food production, […]
The ‘Root’ to Women’s Empowerment
Growing up in rural south-east Nigeria, as the first born child in my family, I assisted my mum in her small business as she struggled to make a living. When the opportunity to go and live with my aunt in eastern Nigerian arose, I was excited; I thought I would be relieved from the hard […]
Creating Business Value through Improved WASH
Businesses need to do more to understand the impact of poor water, sanitation and hygiene (WASH) in their own supply chains, as well as the impact that their water and sanitation usage has on the cities and towns in which they operate and on the sometimes water-scarce regions in which they are located. These were […]
African Diaspora: Mobilizing Resources and Skills in Uganda
African diaspora love their heritage countries and most send support in various forms to their families that remained behind. Most send money and it has been noted that remittances to Africa have surpassed Western aid. Beyond sending money, Africans in the diaspora have setup various networks to address issues impacting entire communities back home by […]